Lazy Hazy Crazy Summer Days

Gosh…what a beautiful summer we’ve been having lately! The weather has been just perfect…not too hot or humid…the days just seem to fly by…I apologize for the long posts lately…when I get a chance to write, I really let it all out, lol!!

Elena has been doing pretty good…we have our challenging moments but thankfully there’s a lot more fulfilling moments…I am so grateful for how often I laugh these days, really laugh…I can’t remember any time in my life that I’ve laughed more often than these last few weeks…the other day Elena did something funny, I laughed then she laugh which made me laugh harder which made her laugh harder…it was hilarious!

Switching to 3 hour feeds was easier than I thought it would be…but I wouldn’t say it was completely easy either…I do feel like we have a semblance of a schedule & routine now though. It’s amazing what a difference that one extra hour between feedings makes…we have time to do things & I am confident going out more…Elena is eating better & sleeping really well. She wakes & nurses about 9am, nurses again about noon & naps, nurses around 3pm & naps, nurses about 6pm…we’ve been taking nice long walks in the evening at about 7pm & by the time we get home, I give Elena her bath & that takes us to her 9pm feeding when she settles for the night. Fantastic…for a week…then this last week Elena woke up in the middle of the night 3 nights in a row. I’m not really complaining since she nursed & went right back to sleep…but since then, she’s not going to bed after her 9pm feeding anymore. She falls asleep but wakes up after 40 minutes & stays up until midnight but then goes down for the night…I guess the 12 hour sleeps were too good to last but I’m guessing that since she’s getting more consistent day time naps, she only needs the 9 hours at night…and 9 hours is pretty sweet so I’ll take it. The challenging part is the 20-40 minutes before she’s due to eat…she can get very cranky & fussy…not every time but often enough…I can usually distract her but I often just give in & feed her 10-15 minutes early.

The one thing that soothes Elena 90% of the time is if I sing to her…I’m not being humble or self deprecating when I say I can’t sing…I truly have no musical talent & am completely tone deaf! So am completely flattered that she loves my singing so much…my other singing issue is that I don’t remember most of the lyrics to kids songs so end up doing medleys of a bunch of songs, lol! Anyway, one of the songs she likes the most is “Old MacDonald Had a Farm”…easy for me since I know all the words ;) & I think Elena loves all my goofy animal noises (our Old MacDonald has monkeys & elephants on his farm!)…because of Elena’s love of this particular song, I remembered having a toy when I was a kid that I think many of us had, The See’n’Say where you pull the string & it makes the noise of the animal the arrow was pointing at…well lo & behold Fi.sher Pri.ce has made an updated version that I finally tracked down! Elena loves it!

I didn’t end up starting Elena on cereal just yet even though the Dr gave us the green light…I was so excited for her to start that I went out & bought bowls & spoons & Rice Cereal that I can add breast milk to…then I just didn’t feel confident that she was quite ready…I can’t really explain why, it was really more of a gut feeling but I’m just not sure she’s quite ready…she’s showing great interest in watching us eat & other signs she’s almost ready but the one thing that was catching me up was this tongue reflex thing…I don’t quite understand what I should be looking for. If anyone can describe this for me, I’d greatly appreciate it.

Now I will leave you with a few photos since I haven’t posted any in a while…

A Laughing Moment

The day we put her crib together...doesn't she look tiny in it?!?

Playing in her Exersaucer

Out for our evening walk